The God who mends the Broken!

By Helen Jesze, 9^th July 2021

“The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is on me, because the LORD has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners, to proclaim the year of the LORD’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn, and provide for those who grieve in Zion— to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair. They will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the LORD for the display of his splendor.”

Isaiah 61: 1-3 NIV

“When the righteous cry for help, the Lord hears and delivers them out of all their troubles. The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit,”

Psalm 34:17+18 ESV

When I was 22 years old, I was working at the T.L.Osborn Evangelistic Assn. office in Birmingham, doing a great deal of overtime, and doing work which later four people took over. I loved my job and knew that I was in the centre of God’s will. At weekends I was very active in the church I attended, doing door-to-door work, speaking in open-airs, playing the piano, helping in the Sunday School. I also lived alone so shopping and housework had to be fitted in too.

My main work was to read and handle hundreds, sometimes thousands, of letters which people sent in for prayer or counselling. After being there about two and a half years, the concentrated work- load, plus some severe personal problems, put a great strain on me, and I had terrible attacks of weakness and fear. The contents of the letters filled my mind, and it seemed as though everyone in the world was terribly sick or demon-possessed! Sleep eluded me and I wondered whatever was wrong.

One day I collapsed at work, and was sent to the hospital. The doctors found nothing wrong, but told me I had a nervous breakdown. Just before this, a friend had come to live with me and she nursed me, for I now lay in bed, weak and hardly able to eat. It seemed as if my whole nervous system had collapsed, and waves of fear engulfed me, The doctor gave me some tablets, but after the first one I fell into a deep stupor and dreamed I was falling into a pit of fire. It was a terrible experience. I started up screaming the Name of Jesus, and knew that tablets were not my answer for me.

I read in my Bible, turning its pages for hours, calling out to God to help me. Every time an attack of fear came, I repeated verses of Scripture, sometimes shouted them, walking round the bedroom when I had the strength. I am so glad that I went to a church where the people believed in God answering prayer, and they were doing battle for me in the unseen world.

One day I was weaker than ever, and the lady who was looking after me went into the living-room and began to cry out to God to heal me. Just about that time, I was lying in bed and I saw a vision with my spiritual eyes of a huge light-filled throne, and on the throne sat a stately figure. His face was not clear, but I knew it was God or Jesus.

As I gazed at him, just to the lefthand side of the picture, right down in the corner, a tiny figure bent over, more like an ant, walked slowly towards the throne. The figure on the throne bent over and gently touched the tiny ‘ant’, and it straightened up; I saw it was me, it had my face! Jesus was showing me his majesty and compassion, so far greater than the state of oppression I was in. He had touched me with his healing power!

From that day I slowly began to pick up. I still needed to stand against fear, weakness, confusion of thoughts and other symptoms. When I began to take very short walks, I would not go further than the end of the road, for I was afraid I would not find my way back. When I was washing-up and there were sharp knives, the enemy would say to me I would take them and cut myself, but I never did. It took me several months to be able to work fulltime again.

One day some friends came to visit and were laughing in the next room, and the devil said to me: You’ll never laugh again! Well, he is a liar; I was 22 then and am 78 now, and I have laughed millions of times since then, and I will laugh millions of times more!! Looking back I realised several factors which led to this illness, and God taught me some important lessons, which I will share with you in our devotional next week.

The picture at the top shows a beautiful picture made out of broken pieces of pottery, put together and making a mosaic. We live in a world that is a throw-away society. When something is broken, we would rather throw it away than mend it. Our God is not like that. I heard a pastor tell how God brought him through when his wife died after an illness, and when his teenage daughter committed suicide. I wrote down some words he said “In God’s garden of Grace, even broken trees bear fruit and we’re all broken in some way!”

There used to be a song, which said “All I had to offer him was brokenness and strife, But he made something beautiful of my life.” Our God takes our broken lives and broken pieces and does extraordinary things with them. He makes the weak, broken and vulnerable into “oaks of righteousness”, strong and stable, planted by his hand to show forth his splendour. We must give those broken areas in our lives into his loving hands, trusting him to mend and make “something beautiful” out of them.

The Japanese have a 500 year old art called Kintsugi which celebrates the flaws and breaks in pottery. Instead of hiding the breaks, as is normally done, they take a special tree sap lacquer and mix it with powdered gold, silver or platinum dust, then brush it onto the broken pieces, before they are put together. What most people would throw away, now becomes a thing of beauty!

Jesus was called “a Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief”. What about you today? Are you staring at broken things? He knows our pain, our deepest burdens, does not cast us aside, but he wants to bring his healing power to mend and make us ‘whole’ – whole means not just ‘healed’, but fully restored, nothing missing!

Kintsugi art

Prayer: Lord Jesus, I pray for all of my readers who are broken in some way. Pour your healing balm and Holy Spirit into their lives, let sorrow be turned to joy, let fear be replaced by faith, and strengthen them in every weak area! You who save the crushed in spirit, be our Deliverer today, we pray. Shine your beauty and golden glory through every broken part, that the world may see what only YOU can do!. We thank you with all of our hearts! Amen.